The night it became dangerous to demonstrate in Tel Aviv

The fascists attacked. Police didn’t respond in time and ran away when the sirens wailed. We were lucky to get away with only three injured, one in the hospital and many traumatized.

(Translated from Hebrew by Michael Sappir)

Police stopping right-wing nationalists from attacking left wing activists during a protest in central Tel Aviv against the Israeli attack on Gaza, July 12, 2014. The protest ended with the nationalists attacking a small group of left-wing activists with little police interference. (Photo by Yotam Ronen/Activestills.org)

When the sirens wailed in Tel Aviv last night one thing was clear to us: the fascists in front of us were more dangerous than the rapidly approaching rockets. One by one, the police ran to bomb shelters and left us face to face. Only one brave and wise officer remained in the middle and attempted to separate us. Only when the Iron Dome rockets lit up the sky with their golden blazes and intercepted a rocket right over us did the two groups stop their shouts for a moment, mesmerized by the sight, from the boom, and then once again: “Death to Arabs!”, “Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies!”

But our fear was justified. By the end of the protest (and a little after it, when they chased us through the streets) one person who had a chair broken over his head was injured and evacuated to hospital, another got punched hard in the head, and one came our with a black eye, someone else had their expensive video camera stolen, and dozens of others hit, pushed, or eggs thrown at them. Some also said that the fascists attacked them with pepper spray. And that’s how it became dangerous to demonstrate in Tel Aviv. Less so because of rockets from Gaza – more because of the fascists and the government’s incitement.

It was clear from the start that it wasn’t going to end well. We came to protest the ongoing killing in Gaza, against both sides’ firing on civilians, against the occupation and to demonstrate for peace talks. We came to say that in Gaza and Sderot children just want to live. And there were some who didn’t want us to say those things.

Left-wing activists during a protest in central Tel Aviv against the Israeli attack on Gaza, July 12, 2014. The protest ended with right-wing nationalists attacking a small group of left-wing activists with little police interference. (Photo by Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

Hundreds of Leftists protesting in the heart of Tel Aviv during a war usually bring out many dozens of police officers in order to violently disperse the demonstration, or if not that, then to separate between the protesters and counter protesters. This time it was clear there would be counter protesters.

Yoav Eliassi (“The Shadow”) called his people (“The Lions”) to demonstrate against the Left, and people wrote ahead of time on his Facebook wall that they were coming to beat people up. There were a few police officers on the scene, and unlike the usual setup for these situations, where the two demonstrations are allowed to take place facing one another from across the street, the police allowed the fascists to stand right next to our demonstration, calling out racist slogans and wishing death to those protesting for peace and against the fighting. All attempts to encourage the police to further separate the two groups, and to call for backup, were to no avail.

It also made no difference when once in a while a fascist went around the policemen, attacked protesters and tore up signs, or when they started tossing eggs. It made no difference that fascists had attacked demonstrators before (for example: just two weeks ago at the end of the demonstration outside the Defense Ministry) and the lesson was not learned – that these are the same gangs, among them masked men who rioted in Jerusalem just a week and a half ago, attacking Arabs. On the heels of the slogans and the incitement coming from the government, Muhammad Abu Khdeir was kidnapped and burned to death.

The policemen did not understand all of this, or did not want to understand. After the demonstration, Eliassi wrote on Facebook that the policemen had expressed their pride and support for him and his people. Past experience with the police, especially the Yassam special anti-riot unit, this does not seem at all unreasonable (and indeed, the regular policemen in their blue uniforms seemed a bit more concerned, a bit more quickly when things escalated.)

As nine o’clock approached we began thinking about what would happen if Hamas realized their warning and fired a barrage of rockets towards Tel Aviv. What if the siren sounded, and our 500 demonstrators along with dozens of theirs had to run together into a bomb shelter? We suggested to the policemen that they could announce in advance that our demo would run one way (the stairway, for example,) and the other the other way (down to the parking lot; or vice versa.) The policemen refused. We decided to take our demonstration, march away, and leave our would-be attackers behind. But they followed us.

And then came the siren. The policemen disappeared. And the fascists attacked. They chased down people who were running to shelter, pushing them, swearing at them and sexually harassing them. With no other choice, we grouped up tightly, surrounded by a human chain, linked arm to arm. We called out all the slogans we had, to keep up morale and unity, to stay safe from fear, to cheer up in the face of the menacing, impassioned mass in front of us.

People watch as the iron dome system intercepts a missile fired from the Gaza Strip to Tel Aviv during a protest in center of the city, against the Israeli attack on Gaza, Israel, July 12, 2014. The protest ended with the nationalists attacking a small group of left-wing activists with little police interference. Three activists injured. (Photo by Yotam Ronen/Activestills.org)

The siren ended, the boom was heard, the policemen came back to separate us, and then another siren, again the police ran away as one, and again we were left alone, face to face, them with their curses and blows, we holding hands and pushing them back. Terrified. And the Iron Dome, a pause, an interception, slogans, and again the police came back.

We decided to march to King George Street and to disperse from there in an organized way. We asked the policemen to block the fascists, so they would not follow us. They agreed, and we started marching. At some point, someone at the café near the square, Nechama VaHetzi, shouted something to the fascists, and they stormed the café with their flags and their fists. I couldn’t see what happened. I think one of them was arrested. But we had to get away, down the boulevard, while the police delayed the rioters.

By the time we got to the corner of Ben Tsion Blvd. and King George Street, and a moment before we started dispersing, a group of thugs that flanked the police again came and attacked. We ran away and managed to take shelter for a moment in the café at the corner. Just for a moment. They stormed the café, broke cups, threw people on the ground and on tables, raised chairs and threw them at people. They broke a chair over one comrade’s head. He’s in hospital now. All of this was accompanied by swearing and sexual threats. The people working at the café were startled at first, and one of them did not want us to come in. “Go somewhere else,” she said, frightened. The others understood quickly what was going on and agreed to shelter us. They brought out water, and ice for our injured friend, shouted at the fascists not to come in, and called the police.

After a while, the policemen arrived. Still not enough of them, but enough to stop the assault for now. We were far fewer than we had been at the start, several dozen, and we set out to march together towards Allenby Street, to quietly disperse from there. Now the police really did do its job, even though just a small force of theirs was there, allowing us to get far enough away to make sure everyone was safely boarding buses or cabs together and disappearing into the night. There were two or three policemen there who really cared, really did their job, and my gratitude goes out to them.

I have been at demonstrations that were attacked in Tel Aviv before. Many times by police, a few times by fascists. One time I was saved from a raging, incited mob in the Hatikva neighborhood. There I had a bicycle, and when the police delayed them I managed to make myself scarce, quickly. This time I was on foot, with a lot of people who could not be left behind. It was really scary. Something like this has never happened here before, but it is crystal clear to me that it will again.

Israel right-wing protesters attack left-wing activists after they protested in central Tel Aviv against the Israeli attack on Gaza, July 12, 2014. (Photo by Oren Ziv/Activestills.org)

I have to say this clearly: it is not just these fascists, Eliassi and his people, or those carrying Liberman’s posters and the rest of the thugs. It comes from the top. It comes from a government which serially incites against Arabs and the Left. It comes from MK Yariv Levin sitting in the Channel 10 News studio, boldly lying about the Gaza siege policy, and refusing to allow Ran Cohen from Physicians for Human Rights to talk, calling him a liar, saying Channel 10 was derelict in its duty when it allows the government to be criticized on the air – criticism which was entirely hard, dry facts. It comes from policemen, who are quite adept at attacking Left-wing demonstrations, or ultra-Orthodox ones, and of course Arab ones – but somehow stand in silence in the face of fascists marching through the streets. And it comes from a prime minister who has been silent for weeks while masses flood the streets, attacking Arabs, swearing, humiliating, a whole population group feeling threatened and isolated, with nobody to turn to.

So yes, it will happen again. We will keep demonstrating, as we demonstrated this evening also in Haifa and Jaffa and earlier in Tira and Sakhnin and other places. But we have to know this will happen again, and prepare accordingly.

***

Updated with a response from the Israel Police spokesperson:

In the evening ours yesterday a social protest took place in the Bima Square. Despite the fact that the organizers didn’t inform the police about the gathering and didn’t ask for a permit, it was decided to allow them to express their protest and many police officers arrived in order to ensure their safety and security.

During the course of the protest sirens were sounded throughout the city and the officers ordered everyone at the location to go to protected spaces.

No participants were arrested during the protest and they dispersed when it ended. Additionally, at this point no complaints have been filed.

The police spokesperson didn’t answer my question about why they didn’t call for backup when it was needed, and whether the police had noted any lessons and will operate differently in the future. Additionally, the police are lying when they say that this was an illegal protest. Israeli law does not require notifying the police of a protest as long as it doesn’t include a march or political speeches. Neither took place at the demonstration.

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COMMENTS

david

MondayJuly 14, 2014

We can pretend that these fascists are victims of their state and that their sentiments are a normal statistical occurrence, which could happen in any society. We could take the incident to be expressive of the usual internal conflict when a state is itself in an external conflict. However, it’s just not the case.

Israel is infected with a disease, which was instituted at its roots. It’s not totally related to Judaism, but rather with the mindset used to institute the Zionist state. People here will lie, cheat, and steal – they know that this is the way life is and it is all they know, since they’ve grown up with that calculus. They know to kill and rob the other and that the admission of wrongdoing is the worst crime to your tribe, a treason. What harm are lies when your team agrees lying is necessary and it has been the beneficial boon on which your tribe, so you’ve been taught, has survived – without which there is no escape from the perpetual rhetorical corner into which this self-victimized group has been required to cast itself. These people have been manipulated so hard by their leaders, and they themselves manipulate others so much that they are no longer in touch with humanity. They – we – are at the point where they won’t even know they were in the wrong as they destroy their own country, because self-reflection is for fryers (suckers). The world hates Israel and is started to hate all Jews and that hatred becomes more and more supportable by the actions of Israel and its fascist majority.

“Leftists” can continue to do the hard work of separating and teasing out the multifarious sources of dysfunction in our society. Fighting good fights and eating shit constantly. However, perhaps it’s just better to condemn ourselves and the entire nation whole-cloth, and welcome a cleansing of this dirty society – a Gomorran pyre on which a redemptive regeneration can occur, but only with the abandonment of these petty selfish claims of helping our innocent brothers and sisters and our so-called innocent selves.

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Emily

TuesdayJuly 15, 2014

So beautifully expressed David. It is so sad what Israel’s Zionist government are doing. Is it a deep psycho reaction to thousands of years Jewish people have been exiled (The Torah) and the violence of the Holicaust? Are there just too many men with too much power and too much ingrained contempt for Jewish history that they are seeking to escape their own burden by being the oppressor as opposed to the oppressed? The more the world cries out for innocent civilians in Palestine, the more Israel’s government will strike.

I love Israel and I cry for the terror both Palestinian and Israeli people are in due to this politically driven conflict.

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Johann

ThursdayJuly 17, 2014

“The world hates Israel and is started to hate all Jews and that hatred becomes more and more supportable by the actions of Israel and its fascist majority.”

No, this I have to disagree with 🙂 I know you speak out of frustration, and probably do not literally mean that. But let me disagree anyway, if just for the benefit of others.

Nobody deserves collective hate and punishment. If 99% of all Israelis were fascists, that still would not justify treating an Israeli as a fascist after seeing nothing but their passport. And even if all Israelis were fascists, this would not justify lumping all Jews together. Even if all grown up Jews were fascists, no Jewish child could be blamed for that. And so on.

You know all this, but I need to say it anyway, because this anti-semitism, it is NOT a “valid” reaction to anything Israel does, and it really gets under my skin. It serves as a tool for exactly those forces you are struggling with in Israel: sophists who need external threats and scapegoats so they don’t have to think. And it’s really discouraging what kind of garbage even well-meaning people sometimes fall for and forward, and that stuff is giving cover to really nasty people. In a way, the suffering of both Palestians and Israelis gets used by third parties for their own petty agendas. And that free-wheeling anti-semitism also strengthens the “the whole world is against us, and talk of human rights is just another way to persecute us” crowd in Israel, I am sure.

I wish I could say something to make you feel better, to let you breathe some fresh air. Do not be discouraged, but also don’t get burned out. Struggle to live, don’t live to struggle 🙂 You cannot carry the whole world on your shoulders, not even “just” Israel. I know this won’t stop you from trying, but still, remember to also be kind to yourself, and by proxy to those who love you. You are not alone; whenever you fight for justice, anyone who ever fought for justice is right beside you in spirit. This too shall pass.. but also, and never least, Shalom.

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Harry Hill

FridayJuly 25, 2014

I just want to say thank you.
I stumbled across this article and its made me feel a little better about the situation – its like there’s a huge huge fire going on and just a sparkle of light that has the power to extinguish it.
I thought all Israelis were on the same side when it came to this particular matter, but clearly not, thanks for educating us.
And DO NOT by any means give up, just because you are outnumbered or outpowered, just like the civilians of Gaza, fight in the face of adversity and know that what you are doing is the right thing.
God bless you guys.

Reply to Comment

olfa

SaturdayJuly 26, 2014

You have all my respect and support. You must feel quite lonely in Israel. Shame what that counyry has become.

In 2002, Matar was part of the Shministim (Seniors) Letter to then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and was imprisoned for two years for his refusal to enlist in the Israeli army. Since his release, he has been active in various groups against the occupation, as well as in several class-based struggles within Israeli society.

About +972 Magazine

+972 is an independent, blog-based web magazine. It was launched in August 2010, resulting from a merger of a number of popular English-language blogs dealing with life and politics in Israel and Palestine.

+972 is an independent, blog-based web magazine. It was launched in August 2010, resulting from a merger of a number of popular English-language blogs dealing with life and politics in Israel and Palestine.